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Spectral power time-courses over the ultradian cycle of the sleep electroencephalogram (EEG) provide a useful window for exploring the temporal correlation between cortical EEG and sub-cortical neuronal activities. Precision in the measurement of these time-courses is thus important, but it is hampered by lacunae in the definition of the frequency band limits that are in the main based on wake EEG conventions. A frequently seen discordance between the shape of the beta power time-course across the ultradian cycle and that reported for the sequential mean firing rate of brainstem-thalamic activating neurons invites a closer examination of these band limits, especially since the sleep EEG literature indicates in several studies an intriguing non-uniformity of time-course comportment across the traditional beta band frequencies. We ascribe this tentatively to the sharp reversal of slope we have seen at approximately 18 Hz in our data and that of others. Here, therefore, using data for the first four ultradian cycles from 18 healthy subjects, we apply several criteria based on changes in time-course comportment in order to examine this non-uniformity as we move in 1 Hz bins through the frequency range 14-30 Hz. The results confirm and describe in detail the striking discontinuity of shape at around 18 Hz, with only the upper range (18-30 Hz) displaying a time-course similar to that of the firing-rate changes measured in brainstem activating neurons and acknowledged to engender states of brain activation. Fast frequencies in the lower range (15-18 Hz), on the other hand, are shown to be specific to non-rapid-eye-movement sleep. Splitting the beta band at approximately 18 Hz therefore permits a significant improvement in EEG measurement and a more precise correlation with cellular activity.

There is substantial evidence both at the cellular and at the electroencephalogram (EEG) level to support the view that the brainstem activating systems control the sleep-state (stage) progression over time that constitutes the overall sleep structure as seen at the EEG. We argue here that the brainstem therefore modulates the time-courses of spectral power in the different EEG frequency bands. These show during non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep a very particular interrelationship the origin of which has received little attention and for which the neuronal transition probability model for sleep structure has proposed a physiological explanation. We advance the hypothesis that if the brainstem is modulating these time-courses then they should show a marked similarity in shape and timing at all sites. Using data from 10 healthy subjects, we measure the degree of similarity of the time-courses over each of the first four NREM episodes at the frontal, central and parietal sites, for each of the frequency bands beta, sigma and delta, and also the cortically generated slow oscillation. All the crosscorrelation coefficients are high and statistically significant, indicating that the shape and timing of these time-courses are practically identical at different sites despite regional differences in their average power levels. These results tend to suggest that two processes may operate concurrently: the brainstem controls the shape and timing of the power time-courses while cortical-thalamic interaction controls their site-dependent average power.